She had spent the day mulling over Logan’s words. If what he had said was true and not some form of parlor trick, then this thing had been a gift from Guy - a gift far more valuable than the nautilus shell beneath her shirt. Many things dawned on her as she lay there in the tent, staring up at the cloth ceiling and piecing together a puzzle she had long since discarded; of his strange nature and his arrival in their world.
Truthfully, as she rose out of the tent to shield her eyes from the bright sun, she was still disgusted with the idea of something living inside of her. But the very same monster had lived within Guy - her most beloved person. If this thing had been a piece of him, he had sacrificed his eye to give it to her. In simply knowing that this had been by his design, she felt the blooming of an unconditional liking for it - that she would always carry a piece of him with her, no matter how disgusting it seemed to her at first.
This was all assuming it was true, of course, to which she still had her doubts. But it would go a long ways to explain Logan’s inhumane nature - how still he could stand and how silently he could move through the shrubbery, though he claimed it had nothing to do with it.
After packing their equipment back up, the procession moved in unison; Zeke and Logan at the front, whereas the rest stayed clumped-together in the back - the boys seemingly incapable of accepting Luna’s personal space.
Still, even with their prying eyes and bickering, she was enjoying the walk. She’d never carried her weight over such a long distance as through the forest and under the watchful eyes of Logans monster, she felt a measure of safety - despite the terrifying set of teeth.
The Ghast kept an ear peeled on the loud discussions in the back - careful to watch the girl’s words in case she let anything unfortunate slip. She had several secrets, most of which would get her killed if the right Ghast came upon her and it just so happened that they were going to be hanging around the right Ghast for some time more. But she was a natural - as expected.
To say that he had not expected to come upon her had been an understatement. But it made sense - the psychic screams, the need to get to the shore - why else would he go there but to find her? He turned over his shoulder to see a slight smile beneath her hood as Marcel once more attempted to court her with terrible, recycled, humorous poetry - a smile he found most endearing. Warm, even.
But the time for feeling endearment and warmth had long since passed - he knew as much. The Monstrum had seen to that.
A growl brought the Ghast out from his musings. They had arrived by the treeline leading up into the mountains, but Zeke had stopped to straighten his back and raise a paw towards the north; further up the rocky hill in front of them.
The slope of gray stone seemed endless, but in the distance, Logan could see something moving - something large and round, surrounded on all sides by smaller, swirling forms.
He reached into his coat to procure a pair of binoculars and brought them up to his mask, staring through the eyeglasses to verify that the Monstrum were moving something.
It was a round, bulbous, flabby form of writhing biomass - skinless arms grasping for the rock to autolocomote the ball. Around it, smaller shapes of Hellspawn were swarming it in an instinctive perimeter guard. They were always different - the colonies. But their functions were always clear when viewed from afar.
Several of the shapes were akin to the ones that had chased Luna over the sands, but it was the large, brutish form in the middle that worried him. It was not a Behemoth - its make was too clumsy for such a classification. It was not meant for combat nor for mass-consumption; it was meant for manual labor.
Its six legs skittered against the rock, silently kicking up dust as the wrinkled legs smashed into the slope. Its head was massive and for the most part featureless, save for the caves for its eyes and a large, toothless mouth that it would use to bite down on whatever stone it could find - anchoring its body to kick the bulb forwards.
He had seen this design before, out at the frontier - on beetles that hoarded spheres of feces to bring to its subterranean lair. Which raised the question, where was this fleshy dungbeetle moving the bulb of biomass?
“What’s up there?” Logan spoke with his authoritative tone. Abraham squinted and looked in the direction the Ghast was staring, but saw nothing.
“The powerplant’s to the north, Sir. Why?” Logan turned to glance over his companions to see them all stare in the given direction with narrow eyes - all save for Luna, whose eyes could see them perfectly fine without the use of binoculars.
“What the fuck is that…” She whispered beneath her breath.
“It’s a transport. A Monstrum caravan. They’re moving biomass from the lowlands and up the mountain… not many will arrive there - not with that elevation. They’ll consume each other before they’ve reached Anza. That’s why the town’s been safe for thousands of years.” Logan spoke to the boys’ relief, but Luna could tell that he wasn’t speaking the entire truth. It wasn’t a lie, more like he omitted a detail he’d rather not say.
He passed the binoculars around and stepped off of the hound to tend to something in his backpack, conceding to an unspoken request for a pause.
“What aren’t you telling them?” Luna spoke frankly, her cheeks wet with sweat beneath the warm hood. Logan’s hands froze - unused to such directness, but welcomed it by answering: “They’re not headed for Anza. That much biomass is valuable - they wouldn’t move it unless they were sure the path led somewhere.” She struggled to shake the disgusting blob from her recent memories, but continued to inquire: “Why can’t you tell them that, then?”
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“Because they’re young and reckless. You, who’ve never stepped on grass before, are far more silent than they are, yet you’re still careful not to talk unless I do.” He spoke matter-of-factly, still into the bag strapped to Zeke’s harness.
She turned back to glance at the disgusting, writhing procession in the distance. “Are you going to kill them?”
“Of course… but I’ll need a plan. And for a plan, I’ll need information.” It made sense to take it slow, but every time she looked at the distant figure, she felt her innards squirm with increasing rage and disgust.
“I’ve been young too. You don’t charge in blindly without a plan more than once.” He raised his hand to his mask and paused there, deep in a moment’s thought. Deciding not to press the matter, she accepted that his process had proven true.
“Here. Daylight’s burning and we need to get to Anza before dark. You either get up on Zeke with me or you chew on this.” He grabbed something from the pack, cracked it in his hands and handed her a palmful of something brown and tangled.
“It’s called quickroot. Take a mouthful, chew on it and spit it out after about one hundred paces.” She took the curious root and sniffed it. The glands in her cheeks and beneath her tongue cramped, filling her mouth with water to wash the sour scent away - its pungent potency painful even from afar.
The boys hesitated not a moment in obeying his orders to immediate effects. Their pupils widened, their backs straightened and if Luna’s eyes were not deceiving here, the young men were suddenly brimming with muscles. Their speech was frantic, hurried, yet it seemed they understood one-another with perfect clarity, discussing something before dropping into a full sprint up the mountainside.
Luna had the choice between riding the monster clutched between the arms of another monster or daring to bite into the foul thing. But she had talked enough for a day and, as tempting as it sounded to get to know the beast, she decided to instead chomp on the gnarly root.
Logan could not stifle a laugh as Zeke let loose, content with having someone who could bother to run alongside him, as if they were a true pack.
He was fairly certain Luna had never ran before, but she did so with fierce intensity - as if the Spawn were on her heels, breathing down her neck. With flat palms, she darted across the morass - hopefully realizing that there was nothing human about her speed.
The boys had a good two minute head start on her, but it had only taken her a minute to catch up to them. Her light frame moved unnaturally fast up through the mountainside, her black coat flat in the air as she made her many leaps and jumps. Zeke was all too happy to sprint between them in an attempt to gather them up, but to no avail - they were all far too euphoric from the narcotics to heed any of his barks or commands.
With great power comes great restitution, or something like that. Logan had heard it long ago and felt its effects for himself. As it were, he was well rested - stretching as the sun set on the distant mountain horizon; his companions dead on the bricks of the arrival plateau just inside the wall. None could move a muscle past clinging to their water-bottles; Luna couldn’t even do that, but Logan was all too happy to yawn, descend his worn and tired hound and walk over to support her head.
Her eyes were half-closed, staring up at the beautiful blood-red skies as the white mask appeared into view. Had she been able to, she might’ve resisted his pull on her shoulders, but not the flask pressed to her lips. As soon as she felt the sensation of cold, relaxing water enter her mouth, she was in a frenzy- draining it down with a profound thirst unlike anything she had ever felt before.
“My apologies, Bear. I had to give them quickroot.” Logan spoke as he pulled Luna’s hood over her face, but kept the bottle in place for her to finish her suckling.
A booming laughter sounded from somewhere behind them, shortly followed by that same, gruff voice stating: “Serves ‘em right. If you boys think this is bad, you wait until the morning. You’ll be puking your asses out your mouths.”
As Logan handed his report to the frightening, large man, Luna took in the scenery of the town, likening it to the drawings of her books. The strange geography aside, she felt cold and claustrophobic staring at the tall walls - like she had just been dragged back into Sitabee to be kept safe from the Monstrum that had taken over their lands. Her experiences with walls and hulls was, thus far, disappointing. No stone or steel could stop the things crawling in the dark - not when they were capable of making such potent, colossal forms. To her, that wall might as well have been made from paper for all the good she imagined it’d do.
“You did admirably, men. A shame you couldn’t get a trophy, but we rescued a maiden and that’s as good as it gets for a warrior. I’ll expect you all here at sunrise for subtlety-training.” Three grunts sounded from the bricks next to her and a glance to the side revealed that the exhausted boys all held a thumb up, even with their face planted in the dusty stone. They might not’ve been capable warriors, but they surely had the heart for it.
“The hero returns.” Ethel said as Logan stepped through the door, supporting the strange woman on his shoulder, nearly raising her off of the floor. The redheaded woman’s grin faded as she lay her eyes on the lengthy, dirty-blonde hair hanging down the stranger’s chest - clad in a Ghast’s uniform, but without a mask covering her pale cheeks.
“I’m sorry, Ethel. She can have my bedspace, I’ll sleep down here on the floor. She’s a friend and like you, I need to keep her close. I don’t want our other friend to get his hands on her.” Ethel’s skin had recovered magnificently, no longer swollen, but still severely bruised and cut. She had been skeptical at first, but hearing that this harlot was, in fact, an enemy of her enemy, her disposition immediately shifted.
“Of course. My home’s your home, darlin’. Lemme get you two some stew - I thought you’d be hungry and since all the townies have been dropping off their rations over here, we’ve got enough to feed twenty men.” Logan set Luna down on the chair and admired his companion for a moment. At some point during the run, her amulet had fallen out of her shirt, now hanging down her neck between her breasts.
It was a beautiful thing - glinting with all the colors of the rainbow and then some. Even in the dim torchlight, it remained a beauty. He ran a thumb along the smooth shell and tucked it back under her shirt before realizing that the girl was still awake - awake and staring at him.
“Sorry. It seemed important and I don’t want you to lose it.” She grabbed her chest with her right hand, pressing the precious shell against her skin, as if to underline how correct he had been in his musings.
“The fellas are mighty glad you fixed up the farms. They didn’t move a single box today - they say the temperatures are fine all over the caves. It’s too early to tell, but Edna swears they’ve grown more since you messed with that dripper than they have in the last week.” Behind his back, Ethel was stirring a tall iron pot of stew while talking:
“I can’t believe I was scared of you the first time I saw ya. I thought you were all monster-killers and torturers, but then you come riding in on that setter to fix our troubles. That other arsehole could learn a thing or two from you.”
Logan could’ve sworn he saw Luna wrinkle her mouth with shock or disgust, only for it to quickly drain away as she smelled the familiar scent clinging to the air of the small house.
“Ethel, actually… you might want to add this.” Logan rummaged through his pocket to find several packs of paper white, which he continued to extend to the redhead. Her long, red hair hung over her cooking table as she opened the packs and froze- staring at the contents with disbelief.
“S-Sir… this is… this is meat. This must be worth a fortune - I couldn’t possibly eat it if you put this in.” Logan raised a dismissive palm and spoke: “It’s fine. You could use some meat - we all could. Besides, I found it in the forest, it’s not like I paid anything for it.”
There it was again - that ill-fitting humor that Luna found so… so… confusing. This man was an enigma and every time she thought she had begun to figure him out, he did something new to throw her off her footing. It was as refreshing as it was infuriating, but she held her mouth shut. She was far too tired to do anything but.
“I could kiss your porcelain face if it wasn’t so damn scary.”